James Dixon, 25, said he had been “fooled by a transgender” days before and that it was “blind fury” which drove him to attack 21-year-old Islan Nettles. Dixon reportedly tried to hit on Nettles when the two passed each other on the street. When his friends started to taunt him, Dixon reacted angrily and asked if “she was a man.”

He then hit Nettles in the face so hard that she fell back on the pavement, striking her head. He hit her again while she was on the ground. Nettles was taken to a hospital and later died of her injuries.

“I don’t care what people do,” Dixon told police at the time. “I just don’t wanna be fooled. My pride is at stake.”

In a victim-impact statement, Nettles’ mother had no mercy or forgiveness for Dixon’s brutal assault on her child.

“I hope you die,” she said. “I will hate you for the rest of my life for taking something that belonged to me. Your mother can see you every day and say ‘I love you.’ I can’t hear that. I’m subjected to seeing my child on a mantle.

“I had eight children and never thought that I’d have to bury one. I had the best of both worlds with Islan — a son and a daughter.”

Nettle’s father, Anthony Mundon, blasted Dixon’s lenient sentence. “Twelve years is nowhere near the appropriate sentence for the man that didn’t care that she was already unconscious when she hit the ground and mercilessly continued to pummel her as she lay there unconscious and defenseless.”

This is such a heartbreaking story and a true testament to the importance of transgender awareness in America.

Islan was lucky enough to have a family that supported her lifestyle, and Dixon went and took that away from all of them. SMH